Author: Michelle

A to Z Blogging challenge: D is for Describing through action and inner voice.

A to Z Blogging challenge: D is for Describing through action and inner voice.

Posted by | Apr 8, 2018 | ,

D is for Describing through Action and (Inner) Voice I’ve read many a book that will grind to a sudden halt as the author stops to describe a character, setting or item. When this happens, I always imagine the characters standing to the side, waiting, or sneaking off for a quick tea break while the author rambles on. It might seem like a good idea to describe each character in their entirety or provide a detailed description of a building or sword, but stopping the flow of the story to do so is jarring. The other problem is that too much...

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A to Z Blogging challenge: C is for Crafting your Story

A to Z Blogging challenge: C is for Crafting your Story

Posted by | Apr 7, 2018 | ,

C is for Crafting your Story (dramatic arc) I briefly touched on the basics of storytelling yesterday and today’s post with expand on that and provide some links I hope you’ll find useful. Each story you write will follow a structure similar to the image pictured below:     This is Freytag’s pyramid, (named after German novelist, Gustav Freytag), and is modified from the structure Aristotle discussed in Poetics. Aristotle decribed the dramatic structure (arc) of a story as being a triangle, but Freytag added two further levels of analysis – rising and falling action – and the triangle became...

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A to Z Blogging challenge: B is for Blank Page

A to Z Blogging challenge: B is for Blank Page

Posted by | Apr 6, 2018 | ,

B is for Blank Page This is where all published novels begin life, and this post is about the different approaches an author might take to writing. If you are preparing to write your first novel, I would hope (and advise) that you start your novel writing career with some short stories. It is far easier to learn the elements of creative writing in a short 1,000-word story than a novel-length work of 50,000 words plus. The principals are the same: You need a beginning, middle, and end. Rising action (conflict) leading to a dramatic ending (climax) Three-dimensional characters...

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A to Z Blogging challenge: A is for An introduction

A to Z Blogging challenge: A is for An introduction

Posted by | Apr 3, 2018 | ,

An introduction Creative writing is my passion. My earliest memory of writing a book was when I was about nine. I was really into Enid Blyton’s boarding school stories and inspired by this, I recall writing a whole (exercise) book on a similar subject. I no longer have that book, but I did keep the one I wrote at seventeen. It was inspired by a mix of S.E. Hinton’s Outsiders and Virginia Andrews. It told the story of five friends living on a council estate and was partly based on fact, and partly on fictional events. I returned to...

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Round two of price rises versus imposter syndrome: making a decision about pricing

Round two of price rises versus imposter syndrome: making a decision about pricing

Posted by | Feb 21, 2018 | |

It has taken several days of research, namely checking what prices other editors charge, but I have finally decided on my new pricing structure. While it doesn’t quite stretch to the recommended minimum rates suggested by the Society for Editors and Proofreaders or the Editorial Freelancers Association, it is a massive step forward for me. One of the trickiest aspects (I think anyway) about being a freelancer is deciding what to charge. It’s about finding the balance between what a freelancer needs to earn to be sustainable while considering the restrictions posed by the market they have chosen to...

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